Prairie Threeawn

My last post was about fall grasses.  In that post, I mentioned a book that I purchased at the Tall Grass Prairie Preserve gift shop in October. 

Tall Grass Prairie Preserve and Fall Grasses

 I'm happy to say the book has come in handy and helped me identify a grass named Prairie Threeawn, a very odd name in my opinion.  Here's how I happened onto this particular grass.

Our cat is an indoor/outdoor cat.  Here's a picture of her lounging on the sidewalk.

She normally spends the day outside, keeping an eye on things, and comes in at night.  As a result of her being outside, she sometimes picks up stickers and other debris in her fur.  She's pretty good about grooming herself.  But, a few days ago, I noticed some odd pieces of grass stuck in the fur on her tail. I gently pulled them out (she doesn't like for me to mess with her tail) and here is what they looked like.

Each one had three spikes at the end attached to one main stem.  I dug out the book I purchased on our trip to the Tall Grass Prairie Preserve.

And, found that these came from a grass called Prairie Threeawn.  From the book, I learned the spikes at the end of each stem are called "awns", thus the name "threeawn".  

The book says this grass tends to thrive in poor soil and that there are seven species in the 3-state area covered by this book.  It also says it can cause injury to grazing animals.  I assume this means the awns can stick in an animal's eye while its head is down close to the ground.  That seems likely as they certainly were stuck tight in the cat's tail and felt quite prickly to me.